by Mark Tufo
The obvious choice was the firehouse, providing that it still had ladder trucks in it. It did not. We’d checked when we were looking for suitable locations to move the family to. I started thinking about going to a hardware store and getting a cherry picker, as they are sometimes referred to, or a bucket lift. Good idea in theory, but they are slow and not defendable. Then the idea that should have been the first was the last. I needed a utility truck. It had the cherry picker built in. I turned to look at the kids, who were watching me. I wanted to tell them what I was up to, but I was in a zombie-free zone, and I really wanted to keep it that way. I was going to be gone for a while. The utility company was a good four miles from my present location. I’d jog for a bit, but even if everything went as smooth as silk, I’d still be an hour. And considering nothing had gone smoothly in a good long while, I wasn’t too firm on that timeline. I waved and was gone.
I moved stealthily for a good block or two, just to make sure that I was putting some distance between the zombies and me and that I didn’t stumble onto or into another lair. I was at the empty fire station when I came back out on to the roadway and decided to beat feet. I took a right up a ramp to get onto Route One and was now a half mile closer to my destination. A cool breeze was coming off the ocean and directly into my face. It was welcome after the foul odor I’d been smelling for the past twenty-four hours. I was in fairly good spirits as I ran, that was until I came into view of the bridge that passed over the Passagassawakeag River. Yeah, I sure as shit didn’t make that up. Means something like, “You fish on your side and I’ll fish on mine.” Even the Native Americans weren’t too fond of too many people crowding in on their space. People haven’t liked people since there were people. I find it strange that we as a species feel the need to congregate in large groups like cities but then make sure we have our own space clearly delineated from others. With doors, fences, and locks. What other proof do you need to realize we don’t like each other?
Sometimes it’s a blessing to have a mind that wanders. Makes focusing on any one problem a difficult feat, which means I generally forget what’s wrong. Then sometimes it’s a curse because I can’t concentrate on fixing any one problem. There were zombies on the bridge, ten as a matter of fact. Then as if to reiterate my point, I started singing the schoolyard song, “Ten Little Indians.” Not politically correct, but pretty sure the zombies weren’t going to have a protesting demonstration any time soon. I kept jogging, getting closer with each footfall. I weighed my options: take up position and remove them with extreme prejudice or merely go for the outrun mode. It had to be by bullet. Sure, it would draw more zombies, but if I tried to get past them, they would just follow me forever.
I put my rifle up to my shoulder and began to sing softly. “Ten little zombies standing in a line. One shuffled home then there were nine.” I rocked back just as the top of the zombie’s head exploded in a plume of red and white. “Nine little zombies, screwing with fate. One fucked off and then there were eight.” I once again rocked back. I’d spoken too soon. I clipped the zombie on the side of the face, shredding a hole through a fair amount of its teeth and maybe part of its jaw. He turned and was looking straight at me. As if on cue, they all turned. Yup, they definitely talked. My next bullet was pretty close to dead center in his forehead. He was down, but the eight little zombies were now running my way. It was okay, though. I had time and bullets. “Eight little zombies, abominations of Heaven. One went to sleep and then there were seven.” It was slightly low, as it obliterated her nose, but the effect was the same: She went down in a tangle of arms and elbows.
I was about to start the next line when I heard something behind me. I almost blew it off. It was far away and sounded like a muffled slap. In this world, it wasn’t a good idea to ignore extraneous noises, though. I turned, pretty sure I blanched—didn’t have a mirror so I couldn’t tell for sure—but my head got light for a second, so I’m thinking it’s safe to assume my blood was running cold. There were enough zombies coming up on my rear they could have filled the bleachers for the high school football team’s homecoming game. That was something I did not have enough bullets for. It was time to run. I went toward the seven, keeping my rifle up, hoping I could diminish the threat to the front. I had a good quarter mile on those to the back of me and a rapidly closing hundred yards with those to the front. I thought about diving into the water once I got on the bridge, but it was at least a hundred-foot drop, and at that height, it would be like swan diving onto concrete. And then, well there’s that whole scared of heights shit, so that probably wasn’t going to happen anyway.
I killed one more and sufficiently wounded another by cracking its femur as to be out of the picture. Five was still plenty enough to do the damage. I hopped over the concrete barricade that protected pedestrians from some of the worst drivers: you know, drunks, texting teenagers, and women. I got as close to the metal barricade that signified a suicide leap as I could while the zombies and I came into close proximity. They slammed into the barricade, some with enough force to break toes or crack kneecaps. With their hands outstretched, they clutched at my clothing. Fingernails snapped off, fingers broke, and still they grabbed at me. When I broke free, the chase was on. Two figured out the barrier and got over it. Two more kept pace on the outside. The one that had shattered his kneecap was still trying, God bless his diseased little heart as he limped along.
The ones to my immediate left were keeping pace easily enough. Probably could have passed me by at any time if this were a road race. Extremely difficult to outrun an opponent whose whole strategy is sprint, continually. I was coming near to the end of the bridge and the slight protection the barricade afforded. Didn’t matter much. The two behind me were close enough that if I passed gas they would get a little payback for all the olfactory damage they’d given everyone else. The larger group to the rear halved their gap. I wasn’t winded, not yet, but it was only a matter of time. I shook my head when, with my rapid look back and evaluation of the trailing group, I saw a woman. Had to have been somewhere north of eighty, easy. She was hauling ass next to what looked like a man a third her age. How the fuck is zombie-ism the fountain of youth? Her blue curly hair swayed atop her head. A tattered gray shawl flowed behind her like Super Grandma’s cape. Surreal didn’t even begin to describe the scene.
I thought I might be in luck if she caught me. With her mouth pulled back like it was, I think she’d left her dentures on her nightstand, forever trapped in a glass filled with effervescent cleaning bubbles. I had somewhere in the neighborhood of a mile to get to the Central Maine Power yard. There was no way I could make it, not in a straight shot. I took a hard right as soon as I was over the bridge. This led to a nursing home, or assisted living facility as our new politically correct world liked to call them. Fucking stupid. So when I was filling holes for the state, I wasn’t a ditch digger; I was a roadway engineer. Not sure why people are so hung up on labels, or how it could possibly matter. The bigger question right now was why did I even care? Zombie fingertips were scraping against the base of my spine seeking purchase. It was a moderate slope down to the house that had an impressive view of the ocean. Although my mother never gave a shit about that, she was always too busy berating the staff for being too fat, too lazy, too slow. Why anyone would want to give the very people that controlled every aspect of your life grief was something that will always amaze me.
I was heading toward the home my mother stayed at until the end. Would it be irony if I were to die there as well? No, I had nothing to do with her fate; the pack and a half habit for sixty years was more likely the culprit. Although there was the argument that my behavior was what pushed her to that practice of lighting up. I shook my head. “Mom, I know we didn’t always see eye to eye. Shit, I don’t even think we looked at each other’s faces much. Still, you’re family, though, and I could really use a solid right now.”
One of the zombies had taken a fall right behind me. I couldn’t chance looking back to see if h
e’d wiped out any others. I saw his arm slide past on the wet grass before I left him behind with a grass-stained shirt—and no matter how much Tide he used, it would never come out, no matter what the commercials said. It did indeed seem as if my mom was looking out for her wayward son. The door to the facility was propped open with a turned over wheelchair. There were a couple of bonuses to this. First, and foremost, I could get in, and second, and maybe just as important, the previous occupants who weren’t already food but zombies could have gotten out. Last thing I wanted was to be gummed to death. It would be incredibly embarrassing because, first, I’d start laughing as the sensation would have a tickling quality. This would change when their jawbones finally worked their way through their rotten gums and I was starting to get torn apart by bone instead of just teeth. Yeah, it wouldn’t be so funny then.
There were a lot of actions that had to happen nearly simultaneously in order for my continued survival to continue. I bounded up the three steps on the front porch in one leap. My living-challenged friends had a little more difficulty. I heard knees, elbows, and chins smack off the wooden decking as they collided at high speed. A few ejected teeth flew past my head and landed on the polished linoleum floor of the home’s foyer. I vaulted over the wheelchair. My hope was that, with my trailing leg, I would push the chair out of the way and the door would close behind me, having the closest zombies smash face first into the heavy wooden door. Want to know what really happened? I jumped too high. The top of my head struck the doorframe, abruptly ending my short flight. My head lost all its forward momentum but not my legs; they kept sailing into the house. I looked like I was getting ready to slide into second base. I was horizontal to the ground and maybe two feet off of it. Want to know what saved my life? Got to imagine it was Benny. You see, Benny was the maintenance slash janitor of the building, and he had a serious case of obsessive-compulsive disorder. I’d met him a few times. I don’t think he liked me much. I always tended to walk over his freshly scrubbed floors after tracking in all manner of debris from outside. I swear I would come down the sidewalk on a warm dry day, wipe my feet extensively on the welcome mat outside, and yet, as soon as I walked in, branches, rocks, small mammals, and their offal would fall off my shoes.
And no matter when I came, he was right by the door, with mop in hand, to scowl at me as I passed by. If he could have beat me mercilessly with that stick and gotten away with it, I believe he would have. It was the high gloss that he had to have on that floor that ultimately saved my life. When my hip, foot, and head smacked off the floor, I just slid—I mean to the point where it looked absurd. Almost like a movie parody, I just kept going: through the foyer, through the receiving room, and halfway into the back hallway. Might have kept going if I hadn’t been placing my hands down, trying to get traction so I could get back up on my feet. Going back to shut the front door was out of the question. Zombies were already streaming inside. I had an equally, if not better, idea now anyway. For the quickest of seconds, the early praise I had for Benny turned sour as my feet rapidly moved in place while they sought a friction they could not find.
It was the door to the bathroom that proved my salvation as I grabbed the handle and pulled myself forward. I took a left when I got out of the hallway. I was now looking at the back door and the ocean. I opened the door, making sure to close it tightly before I started running down to the shoreline. I flipped a bird over my shoulder.
“That’s right, Talbot. Piss off the natives.” I headed to the ocean. I’d like to say beach, but those are few and far between in Maine. Sure, there was plenty of coastline, but very little of what you would call a traditional beach. It was mostly slippery as wet rubber, sharp as razor blades, hard as my head rocks on the shoreline. This was punctuated with slimy seaweed and sand fleas. Yup, that generally made up the Maine coastline. No white sand beaches or little umbrella drinks here, not that you’d want to go in anyway. The water, even in the middle of August, was cold enough to freeze a witch’s ti—. Well, you probably know where I was going with that.
My plan was to follow along the edge of the water. With Maine’s propensity for corners and crags, the journey would most likely be triple the length but uncontrolled by zombies, and that was just fine. I slowed down to a slight jog, allowing my body to catch its breath. I had a hitch in my lungs and a stitch in my side from the earlier pursuit and a constant nagging worry for those I’d left behind. It was hard to look out at the sun kissing the water. The scenery was beautiful, and I could appreciate it to a degree. It’s just that I wish the world wasn’t so tainted. It was impossible to stop and smell the roses when the air had an inclination to smell like dead animals shoved up randy assholes. And it was difficult to take the time and appreciate things when you were constantly being pursued. We were steadily moving from true living to merely surviving. It was not a shift you were cognizant of, but it changed everything. Regular life, which was already fraught with its inherent pitfalls, was now tenfold as hard.
I might have devolved into a small pity party if I hadn’t taken that opportunity to take one quick glance back at the nursing home. I was too far away to make out any particulars, but it was clear enough to see that the zombies had busted through the door and maybe even some of the big picture windows. The pursuit hadn’t started yet; I got the feeling that zombies had a difficult time seeing things far away. It was about time they had some sort of limitation. Although burning in the sun like some other monsters I’d encountered would have been more preferable. I wondered how Jack was doing with his particular type of monster. The gods really must get a kick out of all the alternate realities they toss out there. I wonder if they have brainstorm sessions where they just start naming horrible creatures and see if people can deal with them. We must be an atrocious species that they’re in such a rush to end our lives. Or who knows, maybe it’s fun as hell for them to watch us run around like idiots. I mean, I used to think it was fun to cook ants under a magnifying glass. Most likely the same thing for them. Would I have unleashed zombie ants on the ant hives I’ve terrorized if I could? Sure, I would have. Kids are nearly insane. Doubt me? Think of all the asinine things they do. What won’t they put in their mouths? What won’t they dive off of? What situations won’t they put themselves in? Why do you think parents go prematurely gray or bald? Because it takes a lot of effort to keep crazy Cathy and insane Isaac from running into traffic with nothing more on than a pair of wet diapers and sand pails on their heads.
Good to know that gods are juvenile. Where the fuck are their parents to tell them they’re little assholes! I started running again, partly to forget about the pain I was in both internally and externally. I didn’t know then, but I’d already been spotted and the chase was afoot again. I was starting to wonder how much farther I had to go and had even begun to slow down before I realized I was no longer alone. The shore was getting crowded like tourist season had officially begun and the visitors needed to claim their square footage of beach before there was none left. They were coming out from the yard to my side and some were behind. I didn’t know if I had enough left to outpace them. My options were limited: stop and make a destined-to-fail stand or head into the water. I didn’t think zombies swam, but they would follow into the water. I’d have to go far enough out that they would not be able to reach up from the depths and pull me down into a watery grave.
It’s fairly well known, at least in my head, that I have a dislike for water that is not in little cubes cooling my iced tea or coming out of a showerhead. The odds that there were sharks in this water were negligible. Stupid Jaws for putting that imagery into my head. Even so, it was fall. The water was frigid. There were tides and currents. I was fully dressed, and I was only a moderate swimmer.
“Fuck” was my resignation word as I took a sharp right and headed straight in. The water wasn’t horrible as it slapped around my calves and thighs. When it hit my nether regions, it felt like someone was snapping my balls with rubber bands. If you’re a guy, I’m pretty s
ure I have your attention right now. I began to take in quick, unfulfilling breaths as I dealt with this most unwelcome sensation. If there was any hesitation on the part of the zombies, they didn’t show it while they splashed in, the closest less than twenty feet away when I was nearly at nipple-shattering level. I had to keep my jaw clenched to keep my teeth from breaking against each other like rogue waves against a cliff. Before I needed to start swimming, I once again cinched my rifle against my back. I could only hope the water didn’t foul it up beyond being able to use it. If I knew for sure that it would, I’d just let it go. Between it and the weight of the bullets, my pants, and boots, this was already going to be an arduous journey.
I had a slight panic attack when I felt something rub up against my leg. Fuck it. There was nothing “slight” about it. I started smacking the water and pushing away. Actually fell over into the water, submerging my head, and got a briny solution up my nose and in my mouth. I stood back up and spat out the water. I wanted to laugh, I’d damn near pissed myself because of seaweed, but I had other real problems. The zombies were advancing, and the thought of being eaten in the water, for some reason, seemed more terrifying. I swam, putting as much depth as possible between me and my pursuers. As I hoped, most of the slimy bastards went under, although on retrospect, that was pretty scary as well. I was shooting for the whole “out of sight, out of mind” perspective but not knowing where they were was worse. As fate would have it, some of the zombies had positive buoyancy and were able to stay afloat. I’m sure their legs were still moving, but the arms had not got the message and floated uselessly out in front. I had a feeling they were going to bob in the ocean like message-laden bottles for a good, long time. I felt sorry for the people where these things finally made landfall. The message they were delivering was not one anyone wanted.
